The Friends of Voltaire

The Friends of Voltaire, written by Evelyn Beatrice Hall under the pseudonym S. G. Tallentyre, was published in 1906.[1] In 1907 it was published in Great Britain under the author's own name by G. P. Putnam's Sons.[2] This classic work about Voltaire was still being printed nearly 100 years later in 2003.[3]

The book is in the form of an anecdotal biography telling the stories of ten men whose lives fell very closely together. The ten men were true contemporaries and aside from their friendship with Voltaire they were more or less closely associated with one another. Each of the ten is characterized by giving him an identifying label: d'Alembert the Thinker, Diderot the Talker, Galiani the Wit, Vauvenargues the Aphorist, d'Holbach the Host, Grimm the Journalist, Helvétius the Contradiction, Turgot the Statesman, Beaumarchais the Playwright, and Condorcet the Aristocrat.[4]